Beckenbauer ban lifted by FIFA

FIFA has lifted Franz Beckenbauer's ban from all football-related activity for failing to help an investigation into alleged 2018 and 2022 World Cup votes corruption.

The world game's governing body informed Beckenbauer on Friday that the ban was revoked with immediate effect.

Ethics prosecutor Michael Garcia had requested the 90-day ban on 13 June, taking Beckenbauer by surprise after he had apparently struggled with questions made in complex legal English. The German then pledged to answer the queries put to him in German and in writing, and his manager said on June 18 that the FIFA ethics committee had received his answers to "all its questions".

Beckenbauer's management team continued to believe the ban was not justified because he had no obligation to testify to FIFA, but said that with hindsight it would have been better for him to answer the questions earlier.

"I underestimated the matter," Beckenbauer said in a statement, claiming that the main reason was that "such voluminous administrative things" are usually dealt with by his management team, but in this case he was unable to involve it fully.

Beckenbauer was a voting member of FIFA's executive committee in December 2010 when it chose Russia as 2018 World Cup host and Qatar to stage the 2022 tournament. He served on the committee from 2007-11, joining after he led Germany's organization of the 2006 World Cup.

Beckenbauer is an adviser to FIFA's football committee and a global ambassador for Bayern Munich.

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